What’s Your Big Idea? Introducing Project Teams

January 12, 2017

Over the past 5 years, 100Kin10 has grown to a network of nearly 300 partners all working to enrich our nation’s classrooms with 100,000 excellent STEM teachers by 2021. Along the way, partners have created a community, grounded in trust and a shared vision, made countless bespoke connections, identified dozens of shared practices, participated in hundreds of collaborations grants, co-invested nearly $1 million to bring new solutions to market, and developed new, innovative solutions to deep, systemic issues.

More recently, this network has led the charge to identify the Grand Challenges and root causes that have made training and retaining excellent STEM teachers such a lasting and intractable problem.

YOU have consistently requested ways to take these conversations and ideas to the next level. And so, as we head into 2017, we’re launching Project Teams to turn this hunger into real projects that, one by one, can begin to chip away at our most pressing challenges. This is the scale and shared ownership of problem solving our network needs to reach our vision.

Over the next few months, Project Teams will form as small groups of partners working together on a specific, time-bound project connected to a root cause. Project Teams are partner-directed every step of the way: defining goals, expected outcomes, and taking the reins in achieving success. 100Kin10 will play a coaching role, offering support and structured, proven processes, facilitating workshops, providing travel stipends, and making other connections to help move the work forward.

For the first year of Project Teams, we are looking for a small number of Project Leaders eager to spearhead a project with other partners. As the first step to setting up a Project Team, each Leader will identify a project topic aligned with a root cause.

Curious to learn more?

What exactly defines a project? What does it mean to be a Project Leader? How can I participate?

As always, please reach out with any questions or ideas — to me directly or to our newest colleague, Yasmin Fodil, 100Kin10’s National Director of Community.

Project Teams are exactly what we mean when we say Together, we’ll solve it. These words have been our mantra since day one, and, every year since, we’ve come closer to realizing them. Join us in this next phase of 100Kin10.